7fi NOTES TO THE 



and back, and had bright eyes partially open. Yet they seemed 

 <|iiite helpless under the manipulations of the cuckoo, which 

 looked a much less developed creature. The cuckoo's legs, how- 

 ever, seemed very muscular, and it appeared to feel about with 

 its wings, which were absolutely featherless, as with hands, the 

 ' spurious wings ' (unusually large in proportion) looking like a 

 spread-out thumb. The most singular thing of all was the direct 

 purpose with which the blind little monster made for the open 

 side of the nest, the only part where it could throw its burthen 

 down the bank.' " 



I was informed by a fellow-passenger in the train when going 

 to Selborne, " that cuckoos eat other birds' eggs." My informant 

 said he knew it for a certainty. It is extraordinary that such 

 ignorance can still exist, especially in the neighbourhood of 

 Selborne. 



Mr. King, of Wiggenhall, Watford, tells me that a young 

 lady counted the call of the cuckoo one fine morning about 

 4 A.M. ; the first time, the bird cried " cuckoo " eighty times, 

 the second time, he cried no less than one hundred and thirty 

 times without intermission. 



HEDGEHOG, p. 97. In the bristles of the common hedgehog we 

 find a very curious bit of mechanism. The hedgehog has no horny 

 studs, either fastened into the skin, as in the armadillo (see 

 p. Ill), nor yet has he a bone-formed dome, covered with horny 

 scales, as in the tortoise (see p. 112). Instead of this his horny 

 covering assumes the form of spines, or bristles, each set firmly 

 into the skin at one end, and very sharply pointed at the other 

 end. These bristles the owner can erect in groups, with all the 

 points outwards, presenting a most formidable array of weapons ; 

 but the hedgehog has also power to lay back all these sharp- 

 pointed spines in one direction, viz., from his head backwards. 

 In this position they form a carpet, which if smoothed the right 

 way with the hand is as soft as velvet. In order to find out 

 how all this mechanism was carried out, I have dissected a 

 hedgehog, and was surprised to find how very slight are the 

 muscles which command the spine. They are fine strings of 

 fibres, very similar to the Corugator supercilii, or frowning 

 muscle in our own forehead; in fact, when a hedgehog curls 

 himself up, he begins work with a tremendous frown as he 

 tucks his head inwards. The muscles that work the spines are 

 attached to prominences which project from the backbone, and 

 especially do they spring from the ribs, which I find to be of 

 unusual strength and abnormal width for so small an animal. 

 The vertebra? are attached to the ribs in a very peculiar manner, 



